It has been predicted that wireless local area networks (WLANs) will soon provide a significant proportion of the wireless access to computer networks and/or the Internet via “hotspots”, which enable a user to have wireless connection by radio frequency (RF) communication to a computer network when the user is in a designated area forming the “hotspot”. The hotspots may form part of a cellular telecommunications network and may be an extension of the existing cellular telecommunication networks already widely available.
A problem with accessing WLANs via hotspots is that a user may be unaware of the suitability of the provider of a particular hotspot. Similarly, the provider of a hotspot may have problems in determining whether a request for use of the hotspot by a user should be accepted.
In the following a hotspot is an area where a wireless communication to a WLAN can take place, the area being geographically limited to being approximately tens of meters in size. Several hotspots may be created together in a cluster to serve a site having a size larger than a single hotspot, such as an airport, hotel, conference centre, office building or the like. A hotspot typically allows access to services or information etc on the Internet.